


Crystallisation

by teamfreeawesome



Series: a multitude of lifetimes [1]
Category: Original Work
Genre: Depression, Fluff, M/M, True Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-10-14
Updated: 2014-10-14
Packaged: 2018-02-21 04:55:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,569
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2455532
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/teamfreeawesome/pseuds/teamfreeawesome
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Colby has loved Finn for so many years that it feels like an entire lifetime.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Crystallisation

Finn has big hands. His palms are wide, mud caked into the lines that run delicately across his skin, cracked and flaky from the curl of his fingers as they press into the dirt. His hands have callouses, hard and rough, and sometimes they catch on Colby’s clothes, pulling tiny strands of his sweater away – and Colby is unravelled.

Finn works with rocks, clicking little stones covered in dirt and history. He likes granite; will roll it between his fingers as kneels on the ground, mud and rain water soaking into the knee of his trousers. On those days, wet and gloomy, he looks at Colby; looks up through his lashes and smiles as rain trickles down across his freckled skin, clear against his cheeks and across the bridge of his nose. His hair is plastered to his head, the thick, blonde strands dark from the rain, but he grins, impervious to the weather.

“Colby,” he says, softly. “Colby, look at the crystals.”

He holds the stone up, uneven and red, speckled at the centre with black.

“Nice, huh?”

Colby nods, rests the rock in his palm, and closes his eyes. Nice.

 

//

 

Colby has writers’ fingers, Finn says. Soft, mostly, apart from the indent at the first knuckle of his middle finger. The skin is rougher, there. Used. He likes to write with ink; it feels permanent, inerasable. Sometimes, Finn’s hands warm against Colby’s, they twine fingers – and Finn hones in on that spot, the evidence.

“What do you write?” He asks, eyes so dark as thunder rolls outside. “Colby, lovely, will you read it to me?”

Colby turns his head, the smell of warming radiators like Christmas against his skin, and watches the rain run down the windows, trees bent against the wind.

“It’s sad,” he says, and his tongue feels too large for his mouth.

Finn’s hands catch his chin, eyes meeting his, and there’s sorrow there, deep, roiling and sad.

“Sweetheart,” he murmurs. “I know.”

 

//

 

Colby has loved Finn for so many years that it feels like an entire lifetime. He’s twenty-six, existence stretched out before him, measured in Finn.

Finn’s only ever known Colby like this. Lovely. Sad.

 

//

 

Colby is sad.

He rolls the word around his mouth, lying in bed, Finn’s body pressed warm and sleepy against his side. It’s not the right word, really. It doesn’t encompass this feeling; the emptiness. Colby loves Finn, often feels happy with Finn, but underneath those layers there’s something awful. It feels like clenching fingers and questing hands closing around nothing but silence. Colby’s sad tastes like despair, deep like a ravine on his tongue, and he worries, sometimes, that when he kisses Finn, he’s licking that into Finn’s mouth.

Is Colby contagious? His sweet Finn should never know what it feels like to beat like this. To suffer like this.

Colby is sad like pain. It’s a deep, aching hurt that he doesn’t know how to touch. Finn soothes it sometimes, but that’s not his job. Colby should love Finn with no burdens and taste him with no bitterness on his tongue.

Finn just smiles, sweetly and gently, when Colby voices this, though.

“You’re working on it,” he says, teeth flashing in the darkness of their room. “Talking to the right people. Getting help. I knew, Colbs, sweetheart. I knew when I married you.”

Colby presses his face into the space between Finn’s ribs; wants to bury himself under Finn’s skin as he cries. Gentle hands card through his hair, warm and big, and Colby feels safe even as his heart shudders, painful, in his chest.

Sometimes, though, Colby’s sad pulls him down further than Finn’s hands can reach. He sinks into it, gasping, until it feels like he’s drowning, mouth open and wailing as he grasps for something to save him – but all he can see, through the rippled ceiling of water, are his own eyes staring back, wide, alone.

 

//

 

Finn travels, sometimes. Finds new rocks to bring home, mouth curled pink at the corners as he shows them to Colby.

Colby likes those trips, often. He sits, mug of tea steaming gently to one side, and writes as the rain splashes down outside. He likes the weather because it tells him how to write; sunshine leaves things glowing and Colby writes about Finn. Writes about the taste of Finn’s freckles, the softness of his skin and what it feels like to be in love. Rain, though; that means winter and tea and soft, sweet, warm things.

A lot of the things that he writes are sad, though. He doesn’t show those to Finn. The words bleed onto the page, wounded and crying, and Colby stares down at them. With a shaking hand, Colby bundles the letters up and sends them off; adds them to his collection, and waits to be published.

Finn never reads his books. Not unless Colby asks.

 

//

 

Finn’s office is one of Colby’s favourite places. He has rocks littering the floor, papers spread across the room, and huge, hulking books sitting tight on his shelves. He always looks harried, cute, when Colby catches him here.

“Fuck, I hate marking,” Finn says, staring at the typed pile beneath his hands. “Baby, will you mark it for me?”

Colby smiles, pressing a kiss to the soft space just behind Finn’s eat, hair tickling at his nose, before handing a steaming cup of tea over.

“No,” he says, laughing as Finn growls and sets down his tea to tug Colby into his side. He grins wider as Finn nuzzles into his hip, mouthing gently at the material of Colby’s sweater.

“So mean to me,” Finn huffs, but there’s nothing but affection, fond across his tone. “What’re you doing here, anyway?”

Colby doesn’t often come to the university. The campus feels odd, leafy greenness surrounded by intimidating, academic buildings that Colby uses for inspiration sometimes.

“My book comes out today,” he says, biting the ink-stained skin at the edge of a finger. “I’ve been sitting on this copy. I want you to read it.”

Finn’s eyes close, hands tightening ever so slightly against Colby’s hips as he lets out the softest noise. He presses his nose deeper into Colby’s sweater, and Colby can feel his shoulders shaking.

“Finnie?” He asks, hands coming down to stroke gently at Finn’s thick hair. “You will read it?”

He breathes out a thin sigh of relief when Finn’s head moves, nodding, face brushing against Colby’s hip. Pulling away, Finn looks up, tears clinging to his lashes, heavy and hanging, eyes red rimmed, and smiles.

“Colby,” he says, voice broken. “I will read anything you write. I love you.”

“It’s about you,” Colby whispers, gently brushing Finn’s hair away from his face. “About how I love you.”

Laughing wetly, softly, Finn lets his head fall back against his chair.

“Colby,” he says, and it’s almost a sob. “Colby, sweetheart, you are my everything.”

 

//

 

He can’t bear the sight of his words sitting calm in Finn’s hands, even as it’s the only thing he’s ever wanted.

“I’m going out,” he says, softly into Finn’s shoulder.

Finn hums, turning a page.

“See you in a bit,” he says, eyes so wide as they track down the page.

Colby shuts the front door behind him as quietly as he can manage, snow drifting down to settle in his hair. His feet sink in deep into a drift, and he shivers.

He’s been naked with Finn for years, but he’s never felt bared like this.

 

//

 

Finn is curled up under the covers when Colby gets home, cold emanating from his skin in waves. He sits up when Colby comes into the room, blinking, sleepy and warm.

“Did you finish it?” Colby whispers, crawling into the bed so curl up next to Finn.

Shivering, Finn tugs him closer, tucking the blankets around him.

“Yes,” he says, and it’s all he needs to say.

 

//

 

Colby lives with a roving sadness inside him that can’t be curbed sometimes. Finn finds him in the shower, water beating down against his back as he stares at the tile. His mouth is crumpled, tears tracking down his cheeks, the roll of them unmistakable despite the cascade of wet heat falling across his skin.

“It hurts,” he pleads, voice breaking, and Finn kneels, like Colby is one of his rocks, precious.

He holds out a hand, and Colby grips it tight.

“I know, baby. I know.”

 

//

 

Finn breaks the rose-pot in the garden, soil and petals and green scattered out across the patio, and he cries. Colby holds him tight, and thinks that even his Finn has bad days sometimes.

“We’ll fix it,” he says, and Finn’s hands curl in his shirt as his breath hitches around a sob.

“Yeah,” he agrees, and Colby knows it’s going to be okay.

 

//

 

Colby names it sometimes. This feeling. Calls it depression, and shakes with something like fear.

Finn presses a kiss to his temple and cradles him close.

“I married you and everything that you are,” he says, back warm against Colby’s. “Good days, bad days and the getting-there days too.”

Colby thinks that Finn is stardust, glittering and universal.

“I love you,” he says, and he’s saying everything he can’t name. “I  _love_  you.”

 

//

 

Colby’s book lies on Finn’s bedside table, open to the dedication.

_For my braveheart. You fill me with courage, and these words belong to you. I love you._

**Author's Note:**

> Cross-posted from my Tumblr.


End file.
